


Days Of Redemption

by phrenitis



Category: Mad Max Series (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Post-Movie(s), Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-31
Updated: 2015-07-17
Packaged: 2018-04-02 06:05:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4049023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phrenitis/pseuds/phrenitis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It takes two trips to fight off the scavengers and reclaim Gas Town, no one in the Wasteland giving up anything without dying for it. But it’s a start; truly her Fury Road now, even if she never wanted such a thing all the times she drove it. One hundred and seventeen days of freedom, and she’s making better progress than she expected.</p><p>[This is what redemption looks like after, when freedom resets the days Furiosa counts to zero. The story of Fury Road still begins and ends with survival.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to H for putting up with my constant feelings. I have so many. This movie is a treasure.

“She did not want to be born,” they say to the gathered, a fireside tale told in the waning heat of the Citadel’s valley. “She fought her birth with a sandstorm’s violent strength, little limbs like lightening, striking out in protest as we reached to welcome her.”

Furiosa knows the story, the familiar voices of the Vuvalini also that of her mother, but she can’t leave once it starts, not when it’s Cheedo that asks to hear it, not with Dag listening while her hand absently strokes the slight swell of her belly they all know will grow. And yet more people creep closer as the story is told until the words are being repeated behind her, passed along to even more.

“Our Furiosa,” the Vuvalini announce, and her name is an echo that seems to carry beyond the Citadel and down Fury Road itself. “She was born with all the indignant rage of the world’s end flowing in her blood, as though maybe she knew what had happened.”

“Maybe she knew what was coming,” Dag offers airily but she sounds wise.

 _She knew what was coming_ , the whispers say in response. And Furiosa sees the way others steal glances at her then, the War Pups too young and trusting of gods, their wide eyes filling with shining belief. She shifts uncomfortably at the attention – even though it’s different now, she remembers how stares felt rough and possessive against her skin when she was being watched, when she was owned.

“But with all that fire in her, she never once cried out as infants do, never screamed to declare her arrival.” The Vuvalini pause, and there is a deep silence of anticipation from the hundreds surrounding them. “She was born of soundless fury.”

Heads nod in worship as they turn to her, inspired and desperate for meaning as though she is prophecy fulfilled. Their hands reach out to touch her, sick War Boys and Wretched alike wanting to feel something of her. She is their deliverance, and they don’t understand the kind of fury or hope attributed to her, but there are too many that all want too much to know a taste of it.

“She’s real,” someone says with wonder, and Capable is suddenly at her side gently turning the outreach away.

“We’re all real,” she tells them kindly. “We all have a story.”

And Furiosa’s story is long, thousands and thousands of silent days that she carried with her to finally leave in the blistering wind that danced over endless miles of dead sand.

Her throat is still raw with sacrifice, but her veins hum with new blood now.

==

There’s an explosion they see but don’t hear, oily black smoke thick and crawling its way into the skies above the canyons.

“Bad news,” Toast says, and taps the gun strapped to her thigh. She marches out into the dust to find homes for the bullets she carries, the only one to still wear white, who stands in front of the Citadel like a beacon. Nine days after fleeing and now Toast wants all of them to see her coming.

The first smudge of chrome shimmers at the horizon while they watch. It multiples, grows closer, and soon it’s a caravan of cars, driven by War Boys left bloodthirsty and leaderless.

It’s Cheedo that tightens the belts around Furiosa’s waist to hold the bandages in place, and then nods in approval when Furiosa staggers silently to her feet. They are all far from healed, but these are mere flesh wounds; pain is carried deeper. Cheedo puts a gun in her hand.

The Citadel itself is the best defense they can offer, only the sick and the injured left to fill the ranks. Their small collection of guns are with the few that know what to do with them – the Vuvalini, Toast, and Furiosa –the rest of the weapons just rocks, or twisted and pointed shards of steel, but they outnumber the boys that return.

“It’s ours,” Furiosa reminds them, not hope, survival first.

The roar of the cars reaches them, the clouds of rolling dust next – the ground alive and shaking with the thrum of engines. It sounds like an army, not the remains of one; she’s had worse odds.

Furiosa raises her gun – one body, one bullet – but unexpectedly there’s a break in the noise, engines dropping off until quiet falls and the air clears, and there’s a line of cars sitting right at the edge of Fury Road as though stopped by it. War Boys scramble out to stand in the dirt with arms raised in prostration, pale faces even whiter in the sun.

Toast turns and gives her a little shrug. “It’ll be easier to shoot them now.”

“For you!” The cry comes from one among the mess of boys on the other side of the road. “Imperator Furiosa, all for you!”

“Trap,” a voice mutters from behind her, and Furiosa is inclined to agree.

She tenses when a boy reaches into his car, but he holds up his wheel reverently to her, chrome flashing as he sets it gently down in front of him. “Every one, he said. Every one for you if we come back.”

“Who said?” Capable asks, and looks at Furiosa for the answer.

Dag smiles. “You know.”

Other War Boys desperate for validation and eager to prove their worth add to the bounty, wheels pulled from vehicles and placed on the road, a menu of choice.

“Max,” Toast says.

And Furiosa can see it now, his mark on the returning War Boys seeking purpose – Valhalla nothing but a fiery wreck on desert sand. She knows not to look for him there among the wasted bodies of white, but it’s a gift from him all the same.

The War Boys stand bravely, still dying, but wanting. They wait to cross over, to come home, and one boy points, arm outstretched and taking in the world. “Your Fury Road, he said.” 

==

The War Wives, the people call them now – the Vuvalini named in it too for the women they’d lost, Furiosa and the rest for what they had been. They are venerated in a way she can’t stop, honored not for what was taken, but for what they returned. The Citadel is theirs; they own the war.

Furiosa sends War Boys out for patrols, their instincts too feral for domestication. She knows they need to die free, and the Wasteland offers Witness. But there is no valor in Immortan Joe’s form of death, and together with Capable she tries to teach them honor.

“You have a responsibility to life,” Furiosa says, green climbing the walls around them, the Citadel a shrine for the living.

Capable reinforces the message with a hand on a shoulder, another on a head as she passes, gentle and caring, and Furiosa knows she thinks of Nux. “Living matters.”

“Dandelion,” Dag points out – says it only once, for words of such importance should not need repeating to be remembered – walks a few paces and touches a scraggly looking shrub. “Juniper.”

The boys still defend them against those that would take, eyes wild and war cries ringing above engine snarls, but fewer die for glory. They return, and return again, Furiosa’s warriors of Fury Road. And sometimes she goes with them, not to find Max, but to feel – speed and steel pumping fury into the desolate Wasteland, at those that killed the world – the closest she can get to touch his kind of survival and madness.

So she is surprised when the boys take new names – Nettle, Flax, Horseweed, or Buckhorn – and brand their skin with scars of thorns and vines.

“War Boys!” they chant, scrounging for metal in the endless sand, pulling the remains of her War Rig back to be built into something just as dangerous. War Boys they call themselves, but it’s starting to mean something different.

The mechanics are easier, Repair Boys always looking to create, so the Vuvalini show them pipes that carry water, tell them of aqueducts and irrigation – the many mothers now only a few, but still carrying the memories. Furiosa directs their efforts and in usable dirt they coax from the dead earth, between war machines large and bristling, they pave the roads with green.

At night, she occasionally finds her way under the skeleton of her rig, the bones of it wide and formidable, and she lies on her back in the dirt, smells grease and guzzoline, and listens to the soft drops of water that fall. She is here and not here, remembering her lives before. Over seven thousand days counted with the run mapped out in her mind, and somehow it’s Max with blood dotting home on worn fabric, Max that gives her roots at the Citadel she’d escaped and continues running for her.

“Fool,” she says softly.

==

It takes two trips to fight off the scavengers and reclaim Gas Town, no one in the Wasteland giving up anything without dying for it. But it’s a start; truly her Fury Road now, even if she never wanted such a thing all the times she drove it. One hundred and seventeen days of freedom, and she’s making better progress than she expected.

But she knows this is it, the last stand for any kind of life. There is no way to discourage the hope that everyone holds now, and it scares her to know she’s responsible for it. She sleeps with her ear to the ground and can almost hear the thumping of the hundreds, the thousands that will come to claim it from them. Toast knows it too, her eyes always searching the horizon. Taking back the Bullet Farm is next, and Toast is ready.

Furiosa is one foot out of the car returning back with the scouts when she sees him. He’s halfway across the Citadel grounds staring right back at her, intense as ever as he blinks away his ghosts to take her in. She’s coated in sand, her blood screaming wild and chrome-colored through her, and she can’t catch her breath when her chest tightens at the sight of him.

She’s getting used to being seen again, small doses she can lose in the Wasteland or in the deep bowels of the Citadel where ragged rocks can feel almost damp. But Max’s gaze is piercing. She isn’t just seen, she’s _known_.

His arm comes up then, not exactly a wave, but a form of greeting from a man who’s forgotten how. Dust falls off of him with the movement, and it’s achingly familiar the way the Wasteland is etched over him like rust on metal. 

Furiosa tilts her head toward the Citadel proper in invitation and half expects Max will be gone by the time she gets there, just another memory, a ghost of her own, but he’s waiting for her at the base of the crude ramp that had been constructed some days back. She wonders at the relief she feels at the sight of this three-day man that had so quickly made a difference.

Up close, she can see the twitch in his hands, the way the sun has battered away at the life in him, but dust-logged and water-dry, he’s still operating on the primal instinct to survive, the explosive power she knows he wields still radiating at the edges.

“Thought you’d be gone longer,” she says.

He manages to put forth a raspy sounding acknowledgement as he attempts a shrug and tries to form words. “Needed to see,” he says finally, voice dusty and falling apart at the edges from lack of use.

“See what?”

He looks at her like she should know. “The Green Place.”

==


	2. Chapter 2

Furiosa has no idea where to put Max once she’s plied him with food and water and he’s staggering around after her drunk on the exhaustion overtaking him. The Citadel might be the start of a sanctuary, but it’s hardly more than dirt and rock while they carve out the rot left behind. She’s far from being an expert in the developments, so it’s Capable that decides to put him in Furiosa’s bed and tells him to sleep.

Max is too food-stuffed to argue aloud, mind shutting down to divert focus toward much needed digestion, but he remains wary and on edge, sits on the bed stiffly like the comfort is a trick. The fatigue heightens his madness, the shake of his head enough to keep Furiosa on alert as she motions Capable back just in case.

His eyes search the room for exits, for danger, and then he suddenly seems to remember something. He slides a hand along the frame of the bed as he glances up at her.

“It’s safe enough,” Furiosa informs him.

She knows he feels the shotgun when he nods like it’s what he expected to find – amused, maybe – the tension dropping from his shoulders. There’s another gun in the bag that hangs from the post beside the bed, a third tucked among the small stack of clothes she keeps in her possession, and knives scattered in half a dozen hiding spots she can reach before she’s ten paces from the bed. Since the day of her taking, she’d not found sleep again without a stash of weapons close at hand.

But Max is satisfied with his single discovery, perhaps guessing at the rest, his eyes searching hers as he leans back against the wall. With his guard lowered, she can see the haunted look he mostly keeps at bay, the way he drinks her in because she’s still alive.

“The others will be glad to see you,” she says to fill the silence. His stare is both disconcerting and welcome, and she’s confused by the conflicting feelings that rise up in her.

His response is a grunt, but she sees the flicker of interest he shows in being remembered, in remembering. He offers no further reaction, too tired to muster up the effort. Whatever his thoughts about what’s to come, he seems determined to fall asleep sitting upright, so they leave him in the relative quiet of her room to get any sleep he will allow himself to have.

“He came back,” Capable notes quietly, curiously – a sideways glance making her meaning clear.

Furiosa ignores the implication. “There’s nowhere else to go.”

==

In the old Vault with its arched glass high overhead, they lead Max through the rows of plants that have nearly overtaken the room – leaves and flowers and vines allowed to flourish with abandon in a space previously a prison. The Dag carefully parts the vegetation slowly creeping up one wall and shows him the paintings – _Angharad_ written in large, beautiful loops of yellow and purple while stars and satellites swim in swirls of blue around it.

“Flower petals,” she says to him when he runs a wondering finger over the colors.

It’s rare for them to venture into this space despite the beauty growing in it now, rarer still to do so with a man among them. It was one of the first rooms to be retrofitted, the living area given to the milk mothers while Dag painstakingly converted the dome into a greenhouse.

Furiosa knows Max suspects the room’s prior purpose by the way he eyes what remains of the Vault’s entrance, at the way he must see how the girls are quieter, grouped closer together, their need to trust in him a desperate look they wear. Her own pulse quickens here, memories surfacing as the outline of each weapon she carries presses tighter against her, but Max seems to know this too and keeps at a distance. Even his madness is absent as he marvels at the feel of leaves between his fingers and blinks up at the sun.

“Mmm,” he says and nods in understanding when he looks at her. “Redemption.”

In their new quarters, Toast tells him of the recent attacks, of the defenses they want to prepare, and their plans with the Bullet Farm. She’s taken to following Furiosa on patrol and observing the Vuvalini in their training practices, her focus fiercely committed to the Citadel’s continued independence and survival. And when Max digs into his pack and gingerly pulls out a book for her – the cover tattered and pages loose from their binding, but still a book of knowledge saved from the Wasteland – Toast’s eyes water and her voice fails her. It catches Furiosa by surprise, this gift he’s brought – one hundred and fourteen days away and still thinking of them – and Toast’s reaction seems to startle Max in return. He clears his throat, eyes shifting away from contact, uncomfortable with the idea that his gesture could mean so much.

The others take no notice, too pleased just to have him with them again. He is a drifter, a road warrior, a survivor like the rest, but he chose to help them in much the same way they chose to save him, and it’s an intangible bond that none of them fear. He returned to the Citadel, however temporary, for reasons of his own, but there’s the possibility he came back for them, and she sees the ease it creates – how Toast looks to him for confirmation, Dag for belief – even Furiosa feeling the way that need grows within her for this man who makes no demands of them.

His attention is quickly turned toward Cheedo – the only one other than Furiosa that’s been brave enough to take on the organics and the rooms bathed in red – as she asks quiet questions of blood, of healing. It’s not the first time Furiosa has heard the story of the techniques Max used when she lay dying, but it’s the first with him beside her acknowledging those ministrations.

Her memories of those hours are blurs, pain dominant as she slipped in and out of consciousness, but she remembers how her body struggled to die as he held her against him to deny it, his voice in her ear with words like water flowing out of him.

“A blood bag,” Cheedo says, and Max twitches at the word. “How do you know when to stop?”

They’d seen him twice give his life to another and impossibly still survive. He pauses as he figures out a way to explain, his eyes sliding from Furiosa to Cheedo.

“Choice,” Max says simply.

==

Night falls fast in the desert, hot and dark layered over the Citadel, and Furiosa isn’t surprised to see the Repair Boys are still active, lights blazing as the mechanics continue to prepare the attacking force necessary to wrest control of the Bullet Farm. Toast has plans, has hope, and the boys are happy to build her all the war machines she wants.

Furiosa’s rig is a hulking mass rising from the dark in back, steel edges reinforced and sharpened, a land shark with razor-edged fins. She knows a display of strength will be necessary – the considerable activity at the Bullet Farm is enough indication that the Farmer hadn’t committed more to the recapture of the Wives than he’d had to – and the Farm is not easily overrun. It’s a metal fortress of ramparts and sniper nests barricaded behind a fortified wall, buried mines in the sand on three sides forcing approach from one direction, detection made easy in the barren landscape. Even skirting the Farm with the scouts, Furiosa can’t miss the constant sound of machines churning or the high keen of tortured metal relentlessly being molded and pounded into weaponry. It’s a place to be feared, and she means to have it.

She runs a hand along the hood of the rig – metal fingers brushing metal skin – when a shadow shifts in the cab. Where she expects a mechanic, she’s startled to find Max, his face materializing in the window.

She’d left him with the others, with Capable’s stories and Angharad’s books, glad of his presence though she is prepared for it to be as brief as it was before. He isn’t green to stay planted and tended; he’s the Wasteland itself, rough and unpredictable and driven by the wind. That she’s so quickly found him in a place she didn’t expect is just a case in point.

Max slides across the seat of the rig as she climbs up to join him, and he watches her as she inspects the switch settings.

“Wasn’t stealing it,” he says, dry humor behind the words.

She didn’t believe he would, not really, but she’d be a fool if she didn’t at least _check_. Max waits until she’s satisfied that everything is in its proper place, his eyes scanning the cabin and taking in what’s been rebuilt as though he’s comparing what he sees to what he remembers.

“Bullet deflectors?” he asks and taps the window where curved metal tapers a couple of finger lengths out from the frame.

“For the snipers,” she acknowledges. A push of a lever drops the armored sheeting over the windshield, drastically reducing visibility down to a few narrow strips, but providing essential cover in a frontal approach.

“What’s the cargo?”

It’s a pointed question, like he already assumes something more.

“Water,” she says. “Food, fuel.”

Max is quiet for a moment as he thinks, and she chooses not to elaborate further. It’s only when she hears him rummaging around in the pack at his feet that she realizes they’re sitting in darkness. She feels the touch of metal on her skin before she can lift the front shield, flinches at the contact until she realizes Max is trying to put something in her hands.

“If you’re on the road…,” he says, and the curve of the wheel, the pattern under her fingers is instantly recognizable. It hasn’t escaped undamaged, part of the wheel bent upward, smooth chrome now warped and pitted, but it’s surprisingly intact for all it endured. It’s hers, one of the few things that ever was, and she cannot fathom how he found it in all the wreckage, in all the Wasteland where it’d been lost.

She fumbles to slide it into place, preferring the dark now even if it makes the task difficult. She can tell he’s looking at her though she can’t imagine there’s much he can see, just shapes forming out of shadows with memories to guide them.

The wheel finally settles on to the steering column and she feels the pull of it under her hands, the road that will hum through it when she sets the rig loose in the Wasteland and ratchets up the speed. The days between then and now when she last sat beside Max in the dark are indistinguishable, the smell of the dirt on him close and familiar. They both traveled in a circle chasing redemption, and she wonders at the journey he’s on that brought him back around again.

“The Green Place,” she says, the old and new meaning much the same for her. It represents safety, but she knows it comes with a cost – there are those that want, and those that take. She never intended to fix the world.

“More will come,” Max warns.

And Angharad is on her mind as her hands tighten around the wheel. “Let them.”

==


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this story wants to be a little longer than I first anticipated. Apparently I'm just along for the ride.

Wastelanders arrive seeking refuge, and it's the Vuvalini that pass judgement, Virago personally meeting every single stranger stopped by the road warriors keeping watch outside the Citadel. She is the last to carry the eyes of the many mothers, her perception honed through the years, and she pulls a confused Capable along with her explaining, “There will be need for another, and you're one who can _see_.”

A phalanx of War Boys follows them out each time – whether to serve as a back-up force on the occasions a traveler turns attacker, or simply unwilling to leave the sphere of Capable's kindness, Furiosa can’t tell – they are as adoring of Capable as they are protective. But there are few incidents, most Wastelanders too weak initially to cause trouble, and too grateful later to try.

It seems every Wastelander carries the same bag of distrust and desperation over hunched shoulders, so whatever Virago and Capable sense behind the sunken eyes and parched lips of those that beg for help isn’t something the rest can easily read. Furiosa doesn't question their abilities, and the decisions are swift and final – most are invited to join their community, a few allowed only a short while to barter, and Capable's loyal War Boys take care of the rest.

It’s a system that works, it's just not one that will last; the precious resources at the Citadel alone can't sustain an ever-growing population. Night Fevers still take away nearly as many as word brings to their door, but the tide will turn, and quickly too with Dag's carefully tended gardens and Cheedo's burgeoning resolve to understand the organics and healing. So while excess food and water and guzzoline are a high value trade source, Furiosa knows that it will only remain the case until others gather in greater numbers to take it from her.

But for those living within the Citadel's protection, access to such necessities offers a tentative sort of stability they'd thought lost forever. There are pockets of laughter now, bold and surprising like a dare, like defiance. Furiosa feels the warmth of it, the promise that comes with joy, and yet she can't let her guard down to partake, no different in some ways than all her time in the Citadel before.

"Nothing that way," Max says when he catches her looking east, but they both know she isn't hoping for what might be there, only thinking about what had been. She's found the Green Place again; it’s _home_ she has trouble accepting.

"I spent so long seeking it," she explains as he climbs up to stand beside her in the lookout post, "I don't know if I can trust I've found it here."

"We chase what we remember," he notes, and it's an astute observation that strikes a chord within her.

She's been trying to find what the Citadel might never be able to bring back from her childhood, the feeling of peace and a sense of belonging, of being safe and loved. Worse, she can't tell anymore if what she remembers was ever even real. It's so far in her past, home doesn't seem like anything more than a lingering sort of wish fulfillment.

Max is watching her closely and manages to accurately suss out her fears because he adds, "You don't forget some things."

"No," she agrees once she can recognize the truth of it, thinks of the memories she'd rather have lost. "Some things remain."

Max shakes his head then, but it’s not at her words; he’s somewhere else, his eyes dark, and mind held in a troubled cloud of self-reflection. Furiosa knows there's penance he feels he owes, possibly deserves for all she can guess, his life in the Wasteland seemingly no more than an inability to die. And yet, she trusts him without needing to know more, even draws comfort from him – this strange relationship still the closest she's felt to anyone in a long time.

Furiosa can see the way his thoughts continue to hold sway over him and she steps to the opposite side of the lookout, lets her movement, the passing contact of their shoulders, distract him enough to bring him back. Max blinks twice and his ghosts flee.

To the west, the sun is low on the horizon, yellow fire cradled between twin cliffs as it gently sinks under the curve of the earth. It's a soft goodbye for a violent world, the dead desert surrounding them splashed in shimmering golds. She looks away and checks her gun in the fading light.

Furiosa feels Max studying her, the silent observations and thoughts he collects of her adding to the mental image he's built. What she sees of herself in his eyes is different than what she’s come to expect from the others – he doesn’t look at her like she has a plan, but rather that he knows she has a past. He implicitly trusts what she _can_ do over what she _will_ do, and it’s a far more intimate reflection of her than she believed possible.

Max leans against a little ledge that juts out behind them and then stretches his leg, the movement of stiff muscles bringing forth a grunt halfway between pain and relief. She knows the sound and feels a sympathetic twinge. His metal brace looks sturdy enough though she can see the wear at the hinges from the endless dust it chews. It could use some grease, and she makes a mental note to get him some when he packs up for the road again.

"How long will you stay?" she asks.

There’s a pause, and she's suddenly very aware of her heartbeat.

Max looks uncomfortable with the question, or maybe the answer, as though it hadn't occurred to him to think it through until now. He shrugs, makes a noncommittal noise, and his hands flex involuntarily against his thigh.

She knew to expect as much and wonders why she even asked, why she should care. They both know he returned to the Citadel without any real need and sooner than either of them anticipated, so his leave is likely to be just as impulsive. That the girls matter to him, that she matters to him, is evident enough, but Furiosa isn’t ready, on any level, to think through the reasons more deeply than that.

"You're always welcome here," she says so he doesn’t have to fill the silence with an answer he can’t find. Max finally stops staring down at his leg. His eyes flick up to meet hers, surprise in his expression at receiving such an offer in a world where everything is taken, at the possibility of having a place to run to instead of away from.

She doesn’t say the word _home_ , but she thinks it.

==

It’s Pea – formerly Nut, now just Pea – racing into her room on his little legs who wakes her mid-nightmare, who also wakes Max asleep on her floor, and sends both of them reaching for guns in tandem sweeps of alarm.

"Boss--," Pea just manages to say, and then wraps his small arms around his middle as he tries to slow his gasping breaths enough to deliver the rest of his message.

She should have known it was him, Pea often hugging her shadow for no reason she can explain, but she uses the brief pause to wake fully and get her hammering heart under control. Max, on the other hand, is still disorientated and struggling to make sense of what's real. His finger is off the trigger, but his body is one rigid line, eyes narrowed at Pea like this smallest of War Pups is still a legitimate threat to his safety. She can't say she blames Max for his reaction; she's nearly put an accidental bullet through Pea on previous occasions, her warnings not to surprise people carrying guns consistently unheeded.

"Boss," Pea repeats as he gathers what air he can, and any thought of reproach is swept away by the panic she suddenly registers on his face. "It's Dag."

That gets through to Max and he immediately lowers his gun as Furiosa shoots to her feet. She only stops moving long enough to step into her boots and gather her prosthesis before following after Pea. It's a short distance, the girls insisting on quarters close to hers, and Furiosa is still pulling straps through buckles when she gets to the door.

She hesitates at the entrance, her mouth suddenly dry with apprehension she struggles not to acknowledge. She thinks of Angharad. This is the Wasteland, and she’s learned not to expect permanence. 

When she turns to stop Pea from following her in, she's surprised to see Max behind her as well. He reads her expression and looks serious, but she catches sight of his hand by his side, fingers worrying together anxiously.

"Wait here," she says to them both, and Max gives a curt nod.

Inside the room, there's a raw edge to the voices, fright lurking underneath the conversation. The girls are huddled in a protective circle around Dag's bed, but they part to give Furiosa space to join them.

"It's the baby," Capable says with concern.

"It's too soon," Toast adds.

Cheedo remains silent, her newfound courage shaky. Her face is drawn tight with the effort she's employing to be a healer, but her eyes pool with tears as concern for Dag overpowers her.

The height of panic seems to have diminished, care of Dag reduced to reassurance now that they’ve done what they can. But even without Joe’s punishments, there’s still plenty of fear lingering over the danger of a miscarriage.

Furiosa waves the girls back so she can talk to Dag without them hovering, and they scatter from the bed like a flock of crows startled into flight. 

"Did the bleeding stop?" Furiosa asks.

The Dag's eyes widen slightly in surprise, but no question follows. She nods.

"And the pain?"

"Gone. Mostly," Dag amends. She picks nervously at the blanket on the bed. "What about the little guy?"

Furiosa can only speak from experience, but what she knows is not the kind of information the girls will seek. They look to her for hope.

“We have to wait and see,” she says honestly. From what she can tell based on the discarded rags by the bed, the bleeding was minimal at least – more likely a warning, not a loss.

“He’s tough,” Toast chimes in. “I’ve felt him kick.”

Capable nods. “He’s got that going for him.”

The Dag gives them a tremulous smile and gently touches Furiosa’s hand. It’s a mix of gratitude and support like she knows this has scared Furiosa as much as them.

“You’ll need to rest,” Furiosa tells her once she’s sure her voice won’t shake.

“We’ll take good care of her,” Cheedo says loyally.

She has no doubt of that, and she leaves as the girls settle back around the bed, Capable with a book in hand. In the corridor, Pea sits guard at the far end and she finds Max mid-pace at the other, his face pale and haunted. It suddenly strikes her how attached they’ve grown to these girls after committing their lives for them. She wonders if he’s even aware how they are both unintentionally becoming a part of something.

Max comes up to her with the question written in the furrow between his brows, and she manages to give a small, reassuring nod. There is still risk to Dag, and the baby’s fate is unknown, but the outlook is favorable for once – there are not many women in the Citadel who can lay claim to that. She doesn’t have to explain, Max stands close enough to see it in her expression, and his relief is clear. He bows his head and Furiosa leans forward instinctively, her forehead lightly resting against his.

Peace is short-lived in a world where survival is earned, and she tries not to hold on to the moment.

==


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This will have an end at some point, but then I think about their faces and suddenly there's more story to tell. Their faces are a situation. Please send help.

There’s something too still about the Bullet Farm, too static. Missing lights in a handful of sentry towers set Furiosa’s senses on alert despite the familiar, unending cranking of the machines running hot and loud behind the fortifications. Her patrol is small – three cars sacrificing speed for stealth, a pre-dawn reconnaissance at the lip of the valley to observe patterns – and she’s suddenly uneasy. She glances in the rearview mirror at the indistinct lights just visible from the Citadel at her back.

Supplies from the Bullet Farm are sorely needed for continued control of the Citadel, but the attempt at a trade discussion soured quickly, and Furiosa knows she can’t win a direct attack on the Farm with all its defenses. So she waits, sends her scouts out and plans. 

There is an inevitable conclusion to the immediate situation, the Farm’s food and water supply dwindling with the passage of time. Furiosa can wait them out, but every day passing also gives the Farm an opportunity to keep churning their machines, the arms count rising. It skews the advantage out of Furiosa's favor, the outcome of the eventual confrontation far from predetermined.

She feels for the gun at her side. One hundred and twenty-one days free, and she’s been prepared for hostile encounters since the start.

Beside her, Virago leans forward to peer through her scope.

“Gates are closed,” she notes, but there’s caution in her tone. “Something’s brewing.”

Furiosa eyes the Bullet Farm, drawn again to the odd selection of sentry towers in darkness. What initially seemed random now looks like the appearance of it, as though a few extra posts scattered around the Farm were shut down to mask the true intent behind the others. It’s the unlit towers clustered around the northmost wall that look suspicious, much of the Farm along that edge shrouded under night’s cover, the black extending out into the Wasteland. 

She looks for movement, but it’s too dark to make out any detail. The north section of the compound is unassuming and all but forgotten in the shadows like it's meant for observers to ignore; this area is already far from the main gates and the access road and easy enough to dismiss. Beyond the wall there's also a minefield to navigate – highly dangerous, though not impossible to cross with a guide. To attempt such a thing seems unlikely, but the Wasteland breeds madness, and reasons against the impossible are exactly what makes such actions plausible. More importantly, north is a straight shot to Saltport, and to the Trader. Add in desperation as resources run out, and the Bullet Farm might just be suicidal enough to try anything.

The realization sets in and her adrenaline spikes. “They’re going to run.”

Virago doesn’t get a chance to respond, Toast’s shout of alarm reaching them just before a flare arcs high into the sky. Red fire blazes through the black to turn night into artificial day, and suddenly the surrounding desert is revealed in brilliant, flickering light. Shapes are cast into stark relief and it’s with a jolt of fear that Furiosa sees the Bullet Farm’s attack force rising from cover to her left. They're too close, her patrol in most immediate danger of simply being overrun by the onslaught, but Toast is already on the move, Shade pulling his car out a second later, and all Furiosa can hear is the menacing charge of engines.

Luck in the Wasteland is arbitrary, and rare enough to be a mistake, so Furiosa only has time for a flash of regret that she didn’t expect the trouble cresting in a giant metal wave over the dunes before she throws her car into reverse. For a harrowing moment the tires spin uselessly in the sand, the wheel shuddering in her hands, and she loses precious seconds unable to gain the distance she knows she will need.

Virago fires their flare directly at the incoming force, blinding red light temporarily limiting visibility and complicating the Farm’s ability to get off an accurate shot. Furiosa can just make out the crisscross pattern of the ramming grill attached to the yawning maw of the truck leading the attack when her tires suddenly find traction and the car leaps backward, sand spraying wildly.

The dual reverse gear isn't going to be enough to get her far, but there is no room for panic. Furiosa simply drives by reflex, pressing the car to its limit. She ekes out speed until they’re racing across the Wasteland and the car is shaking with the effort. There’s not enough headway to flip the car around to face forward, so she keeps one eye on the rearview mirror as she makes adjustments to steer clear of the scattered rocks and boulders in their path.

Virago studies the scene in front, free hand steadying herself against the car’s rough passage. “Eight of them giving chase,” she says, and looks satisfied. “Good odds.”

Eight cars against their three; it could have been worse. Based on counts gathered from previous surveys of the Bullet Farm, there are plenty of vehicles missing.

“Check the north wall,” Furiosa says, a sinking feeling in her gut. They’re receding from the valley quickly, the edge obscuring much of the view, but the flares offer them light enough for what Furiosa suspects. 

Virago does as asked, scope to her eye, and gives a regretful tut of confirmation. “More in the mines.”

It’s a split force – the lighter, lethal half facing down the Citadel while the lumbering trade run, loaded down in supplies, makes its getaway to Saltport. Furiosa’s jaw tightens in frustration; she should have guessed earlier that they would try this. All her days of planning against the Bullet Farm, of Toast’s defenses and war machines… and they're stuck speeding backward through the Wasteland in retreat.

There’s a burst of yellow-white flames to her left, and Furiosa is pulled abruptly out of her thoughts. The fire is swiftly followed by a terrific boom, and she catches sight of a burning coupe just beginning to tumble end over end through the rest of the cars in pursuit. The coupe is one of hers, and all the air is suddenly locked up in her lungs.

Bullet Farm vehicles swerve to avoid the metal wreck smashing through their midst, but one is too slow to react, the remains of the coupe slamming into it with enough force that the oncoming car is lifted clear off the ground and then on to its hood. Flames eagerly follow trails of spilled guzzoline and soon there’s a second fireball spitting into the sky – two cars destroyed in a matter of seconds.

Virago is silent beside her, acknowledgement of the loss in the gesture she makes, and Furiosa's eyes burn. She tastes copper and realizes she’s bit the inside of her cheek. Anger and sorrow vie for dominance, sudden bloodlust masking the pain in her heart. She's distantly aware of the surprising intensity of her emotions, the slick oily fear beneath that the car might have been Toast’s. She can't see the second scout car through the Bullet Farm forces starting to outpace them, and she has to consciously loosen her grip on the wheel before the hydraulics in her hand crush it.

She thinks of what Angharad demanded and Capable still imparts, the girls continuing to press upon everyone the promise of no unnecessary killing. From the expression on Virago's face, Furiosa has little confidence either of them will be able to uphold that pledge. The rules of the Citadel extend only so far against the brutality that dominates the rest of the Wasteland.

Her backward speed is no match to the cars chasing them down, and she’s soon bumper to bumper with the leading truck, nearly being helped backward by its steady advance. In the cab, pale faces stare back at her. One boy points in surprise when he identifies her, expression suddenly eager and savage. "It's Furiosa!"

His cry is picked up by the others, word quickly spreading like fire through the cars on the attack, her name shouted over the roar of engines. "Furiosa! It's Furiosa!" 

The Bullet Farm cars seem to find a burst of speed and spring forward, each desiring to be the one that defeats her. In the truck, the boys' eyes shine with greed for the catch, and guns on both sides rise. Virago gets off a shot first, deadly accuracy earning her a crimson splash across the windshield in response, and then Furiosa jerks the wheel in a tight arc. Metal strains loudly as the car struggles to obey the order, her arm screaming from the pressure as she forces the car to whip sideways. Bullets skip over the roof as the boys in the truck finally react, but Furiosa is already standing, firing her gun through the window as they go sliding past.

It's a difficult angle, but something in the tight cluster of shots hits home, the truck suddenly veering away sharply. It clips the bumper of a car in its way and sends both vehicles spinning out of control, a billowing cloud of sand rising.

Furiosa slides back in her seat and quickly shifts, coaxing the car forward for whatever temporary gap she can gain over the remaining vehicles. Her car is agile, but even going forward, it's not swift, and pushing the engine nearly to redline only gives her a little separation from the pack snapping at their heels. Virago keeps them covered as best she can, her gun firing close enough to Furiosa's ear to set it ringing. But the return shots are nearly as deafening, half a dozen striking the back of the car and exploding in bursts of hot fire.

"Incendiary bullets," Virago says as she trades her rifle for the launcher the mechanics devised. It's bulky and heavy to handle, but Virago's strength belies her age. She hefts the gun over a shoulder, barrel resting on the seat frame as she aims out the rear window.

"This'll be nice and loud," she shares with a slight smile. "Probably kill us, too."

Then the gun fires and the grenade rockets through what remains of the back window to punch straight into the car on their tail. Furiosa is temporarily deafened by the blast, but she sees the explosion light up the interior as the grenade detonates. The car behind them seems to stop in place, frame buckling outward, and there is little chance it's still drivable, or that anyone inside survived. The launcher is a one-time weapon, but it's proven effective.

Virago holds up four fingers. Four cars destroyed; four cars remaining. They're balancing out the odds, but nothing has gone according to plan. Furiosa is still in retreat unable to claim the Bullet Farm or its supplies, and with every passing moment, she's only increasing the distance between herself and the Farm's force heading to Saltport. She keeps her scout car aimed at the Citadel, not bothering to disguise the obvious destination, but she already knows it will take too long to make it there and back. Because of the weight of the cargo, the supply caravan's trek will be slow, and even slower through the mines, yet Furiosa estimates within another hour they'll be out of reach from even her fastest chasers. Frustration continues to bubble up within her, but the emotion is tempered by the knowledge she might not actually survive the journey to the Citadel for the reinforcements anyway.

Virago bends down for the rifle, and Furiosa spots another car slowly creeping up on their right. The frame is horribly mangled, part of the roof caved in from some sort of impact, and the rest sheared away completely. But it's still recognizably a coupe, Toast’s scout car, and Furiosa makes a sound that’s nearly a gasp before she catches it.

She watches as Toast fearlessly rams her car up against the Bullet Farm car closest, sides meeting with a loud shriek of metal and sparks. There’s a rapid flurry of gunshots as the boys attempt to take advantage of the close proximity, and it’s a miracle nothing hits Toast. But her insistence in riding alone on scouting trips and making up the weight in weaponry proves a shrewd choice as she triggers the spikes that immediately tear through the undercarriage of the car beside her. The heavy bolts rip effortlessly into tires and metal alike, the car and the bodies within breaking into pieces that hurl like shrapnel into the desert sand.

“She carries Vuvalini spirit,” Virago says in admiration. It’s high praise, and deserved.

The three remaining Bullet Farm cars close ranks, suddenly realizing Toast is an enemy that had temporarily managed to get lost among them. Bursts of muzzle flashes dot the night, but it’s difficult to get a clear shot even with Toast keeping pace at their side, and it’s not long before some of the guns turn Furiosa’s way again. The Farm keeps Toast in their sights, but the hunt is for Furiosa.

A bullet pings off the back of Virago’s seat, a lucky shot that could have caused damage if it’d had an incendiary tip. It’s a narrow reminder of the danger they’re still in. Furiosa is pained by the death of Shade with his quiet intensity and watchful eyes, and his skill in engine modifications would be a tremendous loss to the Citadel. But she still has Toast’s and Virago’s lives to keep, and they’re only half the distance back to where reinforcements wait. Their flares are expended and long since burned out, and even with Toast’s additional firepower, they will have to be very accurate and lucky to defeat the three attack vehicles. Her engine isn’t quite buckling from the pressure, but she feels the loose rattling through the wheel and knows she will have to ease back on the speed if she means to keep the car from falling apart.

Virago leans forward, her attention caught by something ahead of them. Furiosa follows the line of sight, but can’t immediately make sense of what she’s seeing. The night seems to shift in front of her, the lights from the Citadel blinking in and out of existence until she realizes they're being obscured by something else in her path. Something large.

“The War Rig,” Furiosa says in surprise, and almost laughs with relief.

“There’s more,” Virago notes.

As the remaining headlights of the cars around her cut through the darkness, the shadows in front of her take on the form of familiar outlines. It’s not just the War Rig speeding toward them, it’s every offensive war machine lovingly crafted by the Citadel’s mechanics. It’s a fleet; thirteen vehicles armed and ready for combat.

She’s never before witnessed this kind of raw power and strength in numbers coming to her aid, and she is completely overwhelmed, her eyes filling. Furiosa knows it’s Max behind the wheel of her War Rig without even being able to see him, and for once since the retreat began she finally sees the opportunity.

The Bullet Farm cars are still oblivious to what’s racing toward them, but Virago smiles, already sensing what’s coming.

She gives Furiosa a little nod of approval. “Kaboom.”

==


End file.
